Friendship is Dragons
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Page 681 - Sound Reasoning
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Sometimes our DM will only reveal information through songs that are inexplicably played/playing when we meet new characters. Frustrating as hell because he focuses in on an obscure line in the lyrics rather than the chorus or the overall song.
Unfortunately some of those clues were pretty obscure so we ended up needing almost 3 sessions to get through it.
When I'm running VTT, I like having some background noise to fit the mood of the place - outdoor noises, tavern noises, ominous dripping and "I think that's just wind" underground noises.
I try to throw in clue sounds as well - banging, buzzing, goblins being rude, etc. Start low and turn it up a little as the party (or source of noise) gets closer. I love doing this when the party is in full-on not-quite-OOC/off-topic-but-close-enough-that-players-on-point-might-notice situations.
Which happens enough that I have a term for it.
And, of course, I have Yakety Sax on deck. I have yet to see a game where it isn't appropriate at some point.
I try to throw in clue sounds as well - banging, buzzing, goblins being rude, etc. Start low and turn it up a little as the party (or source of noise) gets closer. I love doing this when the party is in full-on not-quite-OOC/off-topic-but-close-enough-that-players-on-point-might-notice situations.
Which happens enough that I have a term for it.
And, of course, I have Yakety Sax on deck. I have yet to see a game where it isn't appropriate at some point.
Beyond that, nothing.
I do type out a lot of sound effects in my 5e pony game, though, like a 'schwing' sound for a blade getting a critical hit on the air as I forgot to account for the Monk's Concealment before rolling an attack.
I have quite a few DMs in my online campaigns who link to appropriate music, although the frequency varies by DM and scenario.
sound effects? not so much, but I was in a supers game where background music played a game changing role.
My character was a guy whose powers changed based on what kind of music he was listening to, and we were facing off against an end of the world bringer type of bad guy in a sports arena in the US.
We were all getting our asses handed to us, and I was playing a support role, having my mp3 player cranked and blasting music that gave me healing abilities.
The bad guy sees this and realizes that the music player is important, even if he doesn't recognize what it is, and takes it out, and slaps me across the arena.
Then he blasts one of the other PCs into the control booth, causing it to go haywire. Lights start going on and off randomly, and the speakers start blasting music.
The GM fires up his 100 disk CD changer and says "whatever is on the stereo is on the speakers." and tells me it is my go.
Then the music starts.
First the guitar riff.
"Ah ah ah aaah ah."
"I was caught
in the middle of a railroad track
I looked round
And I knew there was no turning back..."
My character rose up out of the rubble he had landed in, an aura of electricity surrounding him.
Everyone stopped and looked at him.
I blew all of my hero points as AC/DC's Thunderstruck reached "You've been Thunderstruck" and the city power grid blew as it was all channeled through the stadium's light and sound rig and into the bad guy.
Left a good sized char mark on the AstroTurf, and knocked him out, and damn near killed him.
Damn near killed my character for that matter as well.
The GM had been intending a TPK so we could take a break and play a different game, but we all survived. We still took a break, while he tried to figure out how the rest of the world would react to a bunch of C-listers like us after we saved the earth.
My character was a guy whose powers changed based on what kind of music he was listening to, and we were facing off against an end of the world bringer type of bad guy in a sports arena in the US.
We were all getting our asses handed to us, and I was playing a support role, having my mp3 player cranked and blasting music that gave me healing abilities.
The bad guy sees this and realizes that the music player is important, even if he doesn't recognize what it is, and takes it out, and slaps me across the arena.
Then he blasts one of the other PCs into the control booth, causing it to go haywire. Lights start going on and off randomly, and the speakers start blasting music.
The GM fires up his 100 disk CD changer and says "whatever is on the stereo is on the speakers." and tells me it is my go.
Then the music starts.
First the guitar riff.
"Ah ah ah aaah ah."
"I was caught
in the middle of a railroad track
I looked round
And I knew there was no turning back..."
My character rose up out of the rubble he had landed in, an aura of electricity surrounding him.
Everyone stopped and looked at him.
I blew all of my hero points as AC/DC's Thunderstruck reached "You've been Thunderstruck" and the city power grid blew as it was all channeled through the stadium's light and sound rig and into the bad guy.
Left a good sized char mark on the AstroTurf, and knocked him out, and damn near killed him.
Damn near killed my character for that matter as well.
The GM had been intending a TPK so we could take a break and play a different game, but we all survived. We still took a break, while he tried to figure out how the rest of the world would react to a bunch of C-listers like us after we saved the earth.
I don't use sound effects in a game that often. It sounds great in your head, but somehow comes off substandard, especially if you're using tinny laptop speakers.
My recent exception was a Marvel Supers game where the team was trying to stop a rock star with a song-based hypnosis power from using an augmented ability which allowed her to transmit the effect over radio (and even through recordings.) The players burst in on her before the live broadcast, and in order to stop them, she starts singing "Under Our Spell," by the Dazzlings. The moment that song played, everyone got this "oh crap!" look on their faces, and started rolling saves. It was beautiful.
My recent exception was a Marvel Supers game where the team was trying to stop a rock star with a song-based hypnosis power from using an augmented ability which allowed her to transmit the effect over radio (and even through recordings.) The players burst in on her before the live broadcast, and in order to stop them, she starts singing "Under Our Spell," by the Dazzlings. The moment that song played, everyone got this "oh crap!" look on their faces, and started rolling saves. It was beautiful.
I like having noises that are relevant like approaching footsteps and wolves in the distance but most of my music I play is background music for during the fights. Fights tend to get boring and having something fast-paced playing actually helps to keep my players interested.
That's a thing. Apples are also involved.
It's called "mincemeat". http://allrecipes.com/recipe/22621/old-time-mincemeat-pie/
It's called "mincemeat". http://allrecipes.com/recipe/22621/old-time-mincemeat-pie/
"As many times as you've thought about it, it's still shocking to find your boss LYING FACEDOWN IN A POOL OF THEIR OWN BLOOD"
"As many times as you've seen it, it's still shocking..."
"You are grateful once more for your sense of when to pass on being promoted."
"You are grateful once more for your sense of when to pass on being promoted."
The Cutie Remark part one
(seriously with a Finale filled with so much there is no way I can avoid spoilers)
also gonna try something different instead of numbering what I liked I'm going to give my raw notes (what I liked and didn't like) that i took while watching with ocassional commentary on them
The Cutie ReMark part one
(the cold open)
Twilight practicing her speech for the 12th time to spike is cute (yet another reminder that she is OCD)
(first act)
It was so nice to see Moondancer,Lyra, twinkleshine, Minuette, and all the other canterlot unicorns at the cutiemark magic seminar.
Slide of the CMC and there cutiemarks (you know to remind us that they got them)
Twilight's speech is bringing up the implications of what could have happened if the sonic rainboom never happend (I hope no villian is listen.... Damnit Starlight Glimmer is in the crowd listening shit)
Get back to twilights castle and SG is there with a high level time spell which she casts on the map oh boy. Oh and the spell pulls spike and twilight in too nice.
(garbage notes: CM are the focus yada yada yada, Spike needs to stop talking, Pinkie being Pinkie, The paper is the spell, Right Twilight you have wings)
(Act 2)
So the revenge plan is to go back in time and stop the sonic rainboom thus altering history? (I have a huge problem with this)
(How do timelines work? Wouldn't Twilight Failing her exam and not hatching spike inturn create a paradox where twilight is no longer an alicorn and spike isn't with her, also this would inturn mean Twilight never went to SG's village, which then inturn would mean she never went back in time...... Bucking Paradoxes, TIME TRAVEL DOESN'T WORK! )
Map in the middle of nowhere with the crystal empire taking up half the map
(Act 3)
Ponville in shambles... Sweet Apple Industries!?! WAR!?! King Sombra!?!
Holy crap! Pony War, Power Armor, Rainbow Dash has a Cyberwing, Pinkie pie and Maud pie are Rock warriors.....
THIS IS A CANNON FREAKING FALLOUT EQUESTRISA !!!
Wait what? Twilight isn't sticking around to fight...she's going back to fix things...awwww
Okay so the spell is powerful and SG is evil (also using magic to fly without wings)
The way SG messes with the timeline here is briliant. Filly Dash is so cute and Twilight is being creepy
Okay what version of equestria is it this time? Come on more Fallout ^_^ ... Everfree forest okay, and woah!?! tribal Pinkie and Fluttershy and what!?! Changelings!?! This is bucking awesome
To be continued...
(I should note that this is already extremely long so I will do part 2 on saturday )
as always
J-eagle12212012
aka
Jurririg (hitbox)
aka
Jamie (IRL)
Also, I wouldn't call it FO:E. This setting made much better sense and was a lot more "in-character" than FO:E's historical setup.
oops.thanks for pointing that out. I suck at spelling anyway so it's okay. As for the Fallout Equestria thing This ties things together nicely
And yeah, the gray waste scene is probably closer to the FO:E feel than the war.
What Digo said. I almost wonder if part of the scriptwriters' motive was to give canon altverses where Equestria was at war and/or post-apoc.
(Although yeah, paradoxes. Besides the one mentioned, if Twilight never found her friends, Nightmare Luna should have taken over Equestria in all the timelines where there was still an Equestria.)
I didn't find this episode as good as the recent ones, but then, it's hard to measure up to said recent ones. This was merely "good".
(Although yeah, paradoxes. Besides the one mentioned, if Twilight never found her friends, Nightmare Luna should have taken over Equestria in all the timelines where there was still an Equestria.)
I didn't find this episode as good as the recent ones, but then, it's hard to measure up to said recent ones. This was merely "good".
Not necessarily. It's possible Celestia could have defeated Nightmare Moon alone or found another set of ponies to wield the Elements of Harmony. The idea is that each situation could theoretically have been dealt with another way, but only Twilight and her friends were an instrumental part of EVERY conflict.
I always figured that Celestia had many plans for dealing with Nightmare Moon, having had a thousand years to think about it. The way things worked out in the series premiere was Plan D, with plans A through C having already failed when Twilight didn't make a group of close friends in Canterlot.
I assumed that being part of the time travel made Twilight and Spike Ripple-Effect proof.
(Since the better part of my comment is about the ending and SG as a villain i'll save the rest for then)
(Since the better part of my comment is about the ending and SG as a villain i'll save the rest for then)
So what was the last one? One where Twilight herself took her test failure very poorly (essentially the 0th villain she was to defeat)?
Poor AJ. It's like the world's pitted against her right now.
Here's a thought... How do they hit her? She's in the Spinning wheel that makes the tread mill move when they go flying and the wheel covers her from behind and is clearly parallel to the treadmill. So what did the cherries just take a sharp left turn to hit AJ and NOPONY ELSE who was directly in front of the treadmill?
I don't as much, personally, because usually the way I've seen audio used in tabletop is to add intensity to a situation, to a level that I find challenging to sustain in my own personality.